Increasing Graduation Rate Involves All Ages

District officials are looking at a variety of ways to keep students in school.

The school board has challenged the district to achieve an 80 percent graduation rate, according to Superintendent Dr. Kelly Pew

“Obviously we would like 100 percent of our kids to graduate from high school, but the reality is not all of our kids who are going through school are diploma-tracked,” Pew said during a recent meeting between district officials and the Pickens County Legislative Delegation.

The district's graduation rate has increased recently, Pew said.

“This year our graduation rate did go up several points,” she said. “We were at a little over 75 percent on-time graduation.”

The graduation issue is not a high-school issue, Pew said.

“It is a system issue,” she said. “It is a K-12 issue.”

Kindergarten teachers can identify students who they believe will not graduate from high school, Pew said.

“They can tell you that, which students come in with a gap in learning,” Pew said.

Budget cuts had forced 4K positions and classrooms to be cut.

“That's not a good thing,” Pew said, adding that the 4K program helps “those most at-risk four-year-olds.”

“We have kids that come to us that do not know how to hold a pencil,” she said. “They've never been read to. For a teacher to say, 'Come sit on the carpet,' ... those kids don't know how to do those very basic routines. Getting them into 4K, doing that, teaching them their letters, how to write their names, those are some very important skills.

The board and district were able to add those lost 4K opportunities back into the budget, Pew said.

“We really changed the way we use Title I dollars, to get some of those teachers back into our classrooms,” she said.

The district is seeing gains through a program called Ignite.

“We have some children in first grade that might normally be retained because they're not reading where they need to be reading,” Pew said. “And we know that reading is one of the number one issues that students who drop out of school have. So in our (Ignite) schools, we hire a teacher that works specifically with our most at-risk first graders moving into second grade. Instead of retaining those children, we move them on into second grade. They are in a classroom with one of our very best, most experienced teachers. We're double-dipping them in reading. So they're getting two hours of reading every day.”

Students are taught second-grade standards through their reading, Pew said.

“We didn't retain them – we're trying to get them caught up,” Pew said. “I've been to most of those classrooms and it's unbelievable what those teachers have been able to do with those second-grade children.”

The district has added graduation coaches, positions separate from traditional guidance counselors.

“Graduation coaches identify students at the middle schools and high schools who are at risk of not graduating from high school and provide them support,” Pew said. “They are doing different things with different children, based on what those needs are. They have identified, through the help of our teachers and administrators, kids who really need that extra help. If kids aren't coming to school, they're going to their houses to find out why they're not in school and getting them in there.”

Pew spoke of one student who wanted to drop out because they thought college was out of reach for them financially.

“That graduation coach sat them down and helped them understand that scholarships are available, that they could go on to college,” she said. “And that child stayed, and is still at Liberty High School.”

Rep. Davey Hiott asked if it would be possible to give middle school students access to the Pickens County Career and Technology Center and its courses.

“We have actually spent the last year looking at the Career Center and other opportunities we could offer there,” Pew said.

She said it might be difficult to offer access to students younger than eighth graders, but that they are exploring the possibility.

“We have talked about adding a component to allow some of our middle school students to at least experience and know what's there,” Pew said.

“I talked to a young man not too long ago who dropped out of high school,” Hiott said. “He said, 'I enjoyed the career center but I got started late.'”

Hiott said the young man had started as a junior at the career center before dropping out.

“It came to me that maybe we could have to got to him a little earlier and shown him something that he was really involved in,” Hiott said. “He loved the career center. If there was something there even in sixth or seventh grade, that might get him interested in something that would take him through.”

Pew said district officials have met with Tri-County Technical College about adding opportunities for students.

“For example, our cosmetology program at the career center is one of our most popular,” Pew said. “It's very structured in the number of hours students have to be there. It gets filled up very quickly So is there a way that we can offer more cosmetology outside of traditional school hours? We're looking at flexibility. Our career center doesn't have to be open 7am-3pm. Our career center can be open from 7am-7pm, 7am-10pm. So we're looking at creative ways to do that, that would allow more kids to have that opportunity.”

Trustee Alex Saitta said the board is giving the district a lot of freedom to meet that graduation rate goal.

“They're working on it and they're making progress,” he said.

Saitta said he would love to see Tri-County Technical College professors teaching at the Career Center at night, with students earning dual credit, or perhaps running an apprentice program that pairs middle school students with older students.

“You don't hand a kid a nail gun, but you let them hold a wrench for a twelfth grader in the auto shop,” Saitta said.

Not only would that allow the college to have a satellite campus on this side of Pickens County, it would open students' eyes, Saitta said.

“He sees the path from middle school, high school, vocational school, Tri-County Tech,” Saitta said. “He sees it in that building.”